Risk Society

I received several commissions to write environmental impact assessment reports, mostly for agricultural enterprises. I am required to research, assess and quantify all possible risk factors, even the most esoteric and paranoid. Sometimes I have to ask myself what they are afraid of? but always there is a real hidden risk somewhere, although remote as the Arcturus galaxy. I am investigating the potential reaction of a bakery's sewage on the other fluids in the system. Will they generate noxious gases? All this costs a lot of money. We are increasingly fighting phantom risks, we are a "risk society" increasingly preoccupied with absolute ideal safety, which generates the notion of risk. The State looks at the individual as a potential hazard source, and to create a totally safe and riskless environment, it will end by putting all of us behind a sterile glass compound.